Wednesday 1 June 1664

Up, having lain long, going to bed very late after the ending of my accounts. Being up Mr. Hollyard came to me, and to my great sorrow, after his great assuring me that I could not possibly have the stone again, he tells me that he do verily fear that I have it again, and has brought me something to dissolve it, which do make me very much troubled, and pray to God to ease me. He gone, I down by water to Woolwich and Deptford to look after the dispatch of the ships, all the way reading Mr. Spencer’sBook of Prodigys, which is most ingeniously writ, both for matter and style. Home at noon, and my little girl got me my dinner, and I presently out by water and landed at Somerset stairs, and thence through Covent Garden, where I met with Mr. Southwell (Sir W. Pen’s friend), who tells me the very sad newes of my Lord Tiviott’s and nineteen more commission officers being killed at Tangier by the Moores, by an ambush of the enemy upon them, while they were surveying their lines; which is very sad, and, he says, afflicts the King much. Thence to W. Joyce’s, where by appointment I met my wife (but neither of them at home), and she and I to the King’s house, and saw “The Silent Woman;” but methought not so well done or so good a play as I formerly thought it to be, or else I am nowadays out of humour. Before the play was done, it fell such a storm of hayle, that we in the middle of the pit were fain to rise;1 and all the house in a disorder, and so my wife and I out and got into a little alehouse, and staid there an hour after the play was done before we could get a coach, which at last we did (and by chance took up Joyce Norton and Mrs. Bowles. and set them at home), and so home ourselves, and I, after a little to my office, so home to supper and to bed.

The stage was covered in by a tiled roof, but the pit was open to the sky. “The pit lay open to the weather for sake of light, but was subsequently covered in with a glazed cupola, which, however, only imperfectly protected the audience, so that in stormy weather the house was thrown into disorder, and the people in the pit were fain to rise” (Cunningham’s “Story of Nell Gwyn,” ed. 1893, p. 33).

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Little twinge there? Though Bess' absence is planned, Sam seems to like his noonday dinner to be an occasion, the jolly high-point of the day when either he can go home to sport a bit with Bess and relish (while probably doing his best to pretend not to) the attention of devoted wife and maids, or join good and preferably, learned, company at a friendly or even exciting eating-place.

***"Joyce Norton" What is it that is somehow so modern about that name?

***

Poor Sam... Dreadful news from the doctor he esteems. Well do many of us know the feeling...

(Spoiler ahoy...)But we have the good fortune of knowing things will get better for our boy even if the stone will get him in the end.

"and to my great sorrow, after his great assuring me that I could not possibly have the stone again, he tells me that he do verily fear that I have it again," Poor Sam! The equivalent news nowadays would be to hear your cancer had metastisized despite all hopes I suppose - Sam would have felt equally helpless. Not surprising that he doesn't enjoy the play and he has also had the bad news from Tangier as well. And it seems he is so preoccupied with these two pieces of news, he hasn't the heart to feel annoyed or affronted that those rude Joyces are out when he and Bess call by arrangement!

I am currently reading "Nell Gwyn: Mistress to a King" by Charles Beauclerke (2005). Beauclerke is a direct descendant of Nell Gwyn and Charles II.

I have been pleasantly surprised by the frequent mentions of Sam Pepys in the book. Restoration era plays are well discussed and Beauclerke paints a very interesting picture of life among the actors of the Theatre Royal....in particular the background of Nell and her rapid ascension to longterm royal mistress.

I take it from my book reading that Sam was mighty taken with Nell's charm and talent.

"it fell such a storm of hayle, that...all the house in a disorder" - Samuel Pepys

"in stormy weather the house was thrown into disorder" - *The story of Nell Gwyn and and the sayings of Charles the Second* Related and collected by Peter Cunningham, F.S.A. [1816-1869], first pub. London: Bradbury & Evans, 1852. There were several later eds., including the 1892 and 1896 London eds. "With the author's latest corrections, portraits and all the original illustrations. Edited, with introduction, additional notes and a life of the author, by Henry B. Wheatley, F.S.A." http://lms01.harvard.edu/F/17AXCI1G7S37ITVLY7RA...

View showing the river frontage of Cuper's Gardens, with a view across the Thames to old Somerset House landing stairs. Cuper's pleasure Gardens had operated between c1690 and c1760 on the site occupied by the southern approaches to the first Waterloo Bridge, opened in 1817.

As the previous Governor of Tangier Lord Peterborough had a long running saga with his accounts, a reminder of Teviot's claim...

"He is this day bringing in an account where he makes the King debtor to him 10,000l. already on the garrison of Tangier account; but yet demands not ready money to pay it, but offers such ways of paying it out of the sale of old decayed provisions as will enrich him finely."

"where my Lord Tiviott about his accounts; which grieves me to see that his accounts being to be examined by us, there are none of the great men at the Board that in compliment will except against any thing in his accounts, and so none of the little persons dare do it: so the King is abused."

"very sad newes of my Lord Tiviott’s and nineteen more commission officers being killed at Tangier by the Moores, by an ambush of the enemy upon them, while they were surveying their lines; which is very sad, and, he says, afflicts the King much."